When Britons arrived in Sri Lanka in the 18th Century, landing, as many
tourists do now, on its coastal shores before carving a path deep into its
lush, green geographic centre of Kandy, they were following a well-worn
trail to the country opened up as early as 1505 by Portuguese and Dutch
colonists (Wickramasinghe, 7). The stray bullets of war fired between
European powers had begun to rifle through the globe, touching distant
lands to the west in America and to the east in India and beyond.
As elsewhere in the British Empire, migrating soldiers and ‘money men’
in the employ of the crown and East India Company were followed by
many different types of migrants to the island, ranging from missionaries
and civil administrators to plantation bosses (Wickramasinghe, 8).

By the time the British withdrew their imperial seat in Ceylon in 1948,
economic and political life throughout the island had both gone through
changes and at the same time retained many familiar features. English
had been the language and custom of administration yet the vernacular
languages and practices of Sinhalese, Ceylon Tamils, Burghers, Upcountry
Tamils and Muslims became salient (Wickramasinghe, 40). Independence
witnessed the growth of elite political parties representing different
regional, linguistic, religious and ethnic communities, the Sinhaleseoriented United National Party (UNP) and Sri Lanka Freedom Party
(SLFP), the Jaffna Tamil-based Federal Party, the Ceylon Workers’
Congress (CWC) for Upcountry estate workers, and many more.
Questions of migration and identity often took centre stage. Up to the
deep political polarisation on communal lines in the late 1970s, when
Appapillai Amirthalingam’s Tamil United Liberation Front (TULF) became
the opposition party in government, party allegiance amongst Tamils
remained diffuse. Politics, like life, fluctuated with the onset of time.

‘You see, we were all happy because we had so many facilities that the Britishhad brought in. You see, on the one hand, when you look upon the villagers,you found that our natives lacked so many things. They were – I won’t sayuncivilised – but the Western influence was lacking and – what can I say –the modernisation wasn’t there.’

SELLATHURAI SIVARASA, 81, JAFFNA

‘At one point in my last year, N. M. Perera, who was the leader of the SamaSamaja Party, gave visiting lectures on the Soviet Constitution. So we hadsome very good teachers. Don’t forget, this was 1942, ‘43, ’44, when theSama
Samaja’s were just beginning to get their act together and the CP(Communist
Party of Sri Lanka) was born with Pieter Keuneman andWickramasinghe and
so on and there was a pre-independence ferment whichtook off on the back of
the Indian struggle for nationalism. We ourselves didn’thave the same struggle
as the Indians. We rode on the coattails of the Indianstruggle for independence.
And so we got independence about the same time in‘48. But this was a period,
before ‘48, where everything, politics was in ferment.I was caught up in the
vortex of all this. I began to see what was happening toour country. I began to
see that the plantations were at one time agriculturalland, began to see that
we were self-sufficient in food, that we were the granaryof the East, all these
things. So my growing into consciousness came through allthese lecturers and
teachers of the university.’

AMBALAVANER SIVANANDAN, 89, COLOMBO

‘My mother used to be, she’s very political and politicised as well. Her motherused to be part of the Federal Party, Federal Party kind of members andsupporters so my amma was dragged basically by my ammamma to all of thesepolitical meetings by Chelvanayakam, which is like the Gandhian, the equivalentto a Tamil kind of Gandhian. And my amma, she used to go there. I wasn’tvery
sure she was very conscious about the politics around her but becauseshe grew
up in that environment where women were especially very politicisedshe,
later on with the war and with the developments and the discriminatorykind
of evolution of Sri Lankan post-colonial politics, she used to become verynationalist and very supportive of the resistance and very understanding
alsoof their ideas and of their aims.’

SINTHUJAN VARATHARAJAH, 27, GERMANY

‘I grew up in a political household where politics was the subject. Even mymother, who was only educated up to grade 8, knew everything about politics.In fact, my father took a picture of the ‘58 riots from the YMCA top floor…I listened in on conversations with his friends so I knew all about the politiciansand who did what, satyagraha and Galle Face sittings. And he [father] was alsothe right man. He was supporting Congress, Tamil Congress. He worked withG. G. Ponnambalam, intensely.’

PEARL THEVANAYAGAM, 58, JAFFNA

‘My mum was not into politics at all but my father was very much into serviceactivities and that kind of thing because he’s originally from Upcountry.He had
that passion, I think, that people who are from the Upcountry, whoare educated
and all that, should do something for the workers, estate workerswho had a very
raw deal he felt, let down by the Tamils – Tamil politicians fromJaffna and the
Sinhalese politicians. But that age I can’t remember anything.But later, yes,
later I got very much into that. That’s why I went and did politicalscience in
university too. I was very political. No, they didn’t discuss. Mum anddad never
discussed. I can’t remember. But my father was very much involved.Later I
remember meetings would happen, other solicitors and others whowere
interested, they would kind of have meetings.’

AMBICA SELVARAJ, 62, COLOMBO

‘…My father always discussed about politics but he’s not a Tamil nationalist.Actually his ideas belong to always UNP party. He’s always talking aboutpolitics but there is no involvement in anything, not much, yeah.’

MALE, 47, BATTICALOA

‘There was an organisation called Suya-Aadchi Kazhakam (TamilarSuya-
Aadchi Kazhakam) that is…it actually means self-determination, yeah.That organisation would put up posters saying that Tamils didn’t have
anynation so we should find a nation and all those kind of posters.
I could havebeen, I don’t know, but I could have been inspired by those
posters andpropagandas as well.’